Six Days (20 page)

E
rin begins to wail as I spur the horse forward, ducking through the hedgerow branches, out into the open. Maleeva comes bounding up alongside me – her strides ragged and off balance. I know there ain’t no point in stealth – we’ve got to go for it. It’s a straight race to the stones of Arbor Low now.

I keep my head low, almost against the mane, feeling the horse strain forward, and ahead of me the field slopes upward into steep banks of turf – the edge of the circle? I blot out thoughts of Peyto and Erin. Only getting to the
Aeolus
matters now. I charge to the top of the slope, and the horse rears up, spooked by the sudden dip that lies over the edge. The circle stretches below me, sheltered on all sides by great banks of earth, like a crater. I slide out of the saddle and pull the horse down, trying to soothe him. Back toward Gib Hill, I can see men scurrying about in all directions, headlights firing up, and
over the wind comes the sound of engines and shouting.

I watch in horror as Peyto and Erin stumble out into the open field, trying to catch up with us.

“Come on!” cries Maleeva. “We can’t help them! Do what you have to do!”

She drags me down into the circle. Here, protected from the wind, lies a ring of maybe thirty stones, fallen and half buried in the ground. They’re all misshapen, covered in splashes of lichen, weathered and broken. It’s a forbidding place, and somehow I know it’s unimaginably old – old even when Halina had been queen of her tribe. I’m dazed at being there at last – the place where she’d come to Earth all those thousands of years ago …

“Cass! Hurry! Call the shuttle! Do it now!”

I pull out the flinder and stare at its pulsing surface. I think about how I reset the shuttle, just with thoughts. Then I close my eyes and sing, reaching out with my mind, and sending out them seven simple notes. But nothing happens. Maybe it’s buried too deep. A scream rises to my throat – I feel it lodging there, building up. All this way for nothing!

But then a grinding starts deep under my boots, like boulders being crushed. I step back out of the ring and I’m suddenly showered with dirt and stones. Then thrusting out of the earth comes the dark, gleaming head of a shuttle, shrugging off cloaks of grass, like an animal desperate
for air. A hole opens in the hull surface, blasting mud into a fountain. But the shuttle don’t stop. It writhes out of its burial chamber and plows right through the outer bank of the circle like it’s diving into a wave. I scramble after it, through the ruins of its wake and back toward Gib Hill. It disappears for a moment, corkscrewing into the ground, kicking up a fan of dirt.

Over the fields, jeeps bounce toward me, headlights spiking through the storm darkness, and there, at the edge of the road, are Peyto and Erin, not moving anymore, closed on all sides by soldiers pointing their guns and shouting. But high above the drone of distant engines, I hear the sound of Erin calling, chanting, summoning the shuttle. I’ve stopped singing, so it’s going to her instead …

Something thuds into me and scoops me up. Then I feel the hard, alien movement of Maleeva running – chasing the surge of bursting earth ahead of us. To free up my hands, I stuff the flinder into my mouth, and it’s hot under my tongue, knocking against my teeth. I claw at Maleeva’s frame as her head flops inside its cage. A rocket fizzes through the rain, snaking in low, blasting into the side of the shuttle, and it’s so close I hear cinders hissing into the grass. One gigantic stride – maybe that’s all she’s got left. All the gearings of Maleeva’s frame go loose and we’re sailing toward the shuttle as it banks away from the
jeeps. She hits it on all fours, locking to the surface, and I tumble away, flailing for the entrance hole, feeling it shrink as I snatch at the lip with my fingers. The shuttle careers sharply to one side and I’m sure the thing is gonna capsize and crush me into the ground, but somehow it stays upright and I throw myself in through the hole. Above me, Maleeva’s arms reach for the opening, skittering off the hull, and I grab at her, knowing I’m too late, that the hole is too small to let her in now. That’s when I gob the flinder into my hand and hold it back up toward the open sky. It’s just blind action. I ain’t got a clue if it’ll stop the closing hatch or if my hand is gonna be snipped clean off. But as I stare at my fist trembling against the gray sky, the hatch suddenly sweeps open again and Maleeva crashes in on top of me. And I feel the roar of the engines gather, swallowing me up as we thunder skyward.

There ain’t no time to strap in – we both get dumped to the floor. I can’t even see Maleeva, cos I’m wrenched over so hard, I figure my spine’s going to push through my ribs. Finally, the engines die away and gravity lets go of us and I splay out into weightlessness. It’s only then that I can see if our gamble has paid off or not, cos it’s gonna be curtains if we get up there empty-handed. I spin round and round trying to see it. Nothing. Then wafting out of the shadows like a drowned ghost comes the thing that’s gonna keep us both alive – Halina’s suit.

Peyto’s flinder drifts past my face. It reaches out its two tentacles and gently clasps me round the neck. And it’s my flinder now … I feel it choose me – the way the tentacles brush my skin as they reach together. Then I think about what I’ve just done – how Peyto and Erin have probably been captured by now.

Maleeva grabs the suit. “Hurry, Cass.”

Her voice box cuts in and out. Her skin is wet and pale. I try and blot out what’s happening on Earth. There ain’t nothing I can do. I’ve got to get my head straight – in a few minutes the shuttle is gonna dock and the hatch doors’ll open on the bridge side, where there’s no air.

And so the first part of my plan is put to the test. There may be just the one suit, but if it’s like the others, it’ll change to fit the size of the body that puts it on. And so me and Maleeva become one. I embrace her so her head’s resting against my chest. Then she clutches me, leaving my arms free. I jam my feet into the storklike joints of her frame, and in tandem we wriggle into the suit. I hinge down the helmet, snap down the seals, and wait for docking. I’ve got to hold tight to my plan, stay sharp. Cos when I set foot on the ship, it’s all gonna kick off straightaway – all-out war.

I whisper to Maleeva, “Can you breathe OK?”

Little patches of mist collect on the inside of the helmet from my breath.

Maleeva don’t answer straightaway and from the moment she speaks, I know something’s badly wrong. “I was b-born in a village near Gori at the f-foot … of the Caucasus Mountains,” she slurs.

“What? Hey, Maleeva, hold it together!”

“My father was a t-trader – a man who brought goods … from the B-black Sea ports.”

“Maleeva! This ain’t no time to flake out!”

“M-my mother was a general’s … daughter, a hunter, t-trained from an early age to kill …”

There’s a jolt as the shuttle docks, then the hatch opens and there’s the bridge area, with its tides of litter, like the hold of a sunken boat. I scan for the Okhotnik.

“I had t-two brothers. B-both joined the … New Russian Army – they were … killed in the first w-w-wars to protect our land from … people in the east … invading Mongols.”

Her voice slows down – it’s her battery giving out. The last push to get onto the shuttle has finished her. She’s dying.

“Hang in there, Maleeva! You hear me?”

As I thrust into the ship, her grip around me loosens.

“When I-I was a ch-ch-ild my mother took me hunting … in the mountains. We stalked bears and d-deer … s-sometimes sleeping under the sky …”

“Don’t go to sleep! Come on, fight it!”

I fling myself through the passageways of the bridge. I don’t know what I can do for Maleeva now – there ain’t nothing to do but stick to my guns.

The
Aeolus
don’t say a word. Maybe it’s pondering choices. But right now choices are few and far between. Halina may have fought with it, but she’d have been too scared to try and destroy it outright. The lives of all the sleepers, including her son, would’ve held her back. But me, I’m going all out.

“You know I ain’t gonna reset the shuttle until all the sleepers are awake,” I go at last. “And you can’t reset it on your own. Which means you can’t get Peyto and Erin up here to make them sleepers. And without Erin’s flinder, you can’t repair yourself. It’s over. You got to do what I say.”

Then the ship speaks to me. Its calm, sad words fill the helmet.

“You have come, Cass. But this is not the way.”

“OK, listen up,” I go, trying to keep my voice strong. “I’m coming to get Wilbur and if I so much as get a sniff of that Okhotnik on the way, I’m gonna bail out into space with my flinder.”

“I will not harm you, but you cannot take Wilbur.”

“Nope. Wrong answer. And I ain’t just here for Wilbur. You ain’t got no choice – you’ve got to free everyone, let them return to Earth. Cos if you don’t, your precious hoard of flinders is gonna go up in smoke with you. You’ve
held them with you too long to let them die with the sleepers, ain’t that right?”

“If I die … it is of no consequence. But the flinders must not be scattered on the Earth. It is too soon. They must become strong. They must become
one
. They must watch from the sky. Together, through them, the sleepers can throw out a net of dreams to heal this world, banish the ills that plague it.”

“Everyone’s coming to Earth or we all die up here. It’s up to you.”

“Wilbur cannot leave. His command of the flinder makes the forty-nine
strong
. Wilbur
will not
leave.”

“He weren’t never meant to be up here in the first place. He’s got a life and a family back on the ground. You
forced
him to be a sleeper.”

“Sleepers cannot be forced. They must choose with a free will.”

“A free will?” It really is all-out bonkers. “You snatched him out my arms and swallowed him up! How’s that his choice?”

“I had to let him see. I had to show him the dream of the ancients. The flinders must become
one
. He knows.”

For a moment, I remember the flinder echoes, the spiders weaving together, the web pulling my fingers together.
The flinders must become one.
It’s like the spiders was trying to show me something. A
weaving
of flinders somehow … like the flinders are shattered parts of something …
something
stronger
. And I think about Wilbur – how his head never was in the real world, the world of scavs, how he was always up in the clouds, buried in stories and dreams and things from London what happened years ago. I think about him giving himself that black eye the night we first crossed the river. And the way he clung to the minute hand at Big Ben … Maybe he did choose the life of a sleeper – to travel through time, like Captain Jameson, but forward instead of backward.

But then Halina’s words come back to me.
Never trust it
.

I clamber through the honeycomb of tunnels to the main shaft that leads to the sleeper side. A ray of Earth light punches in from the hull breach as I hang back, trying to see if it’s clear ahead. Gas streams past the edge of the hole where the littlest torn threads are glowing like bulb filaments. The ship swings round a backdrop of stars and in the wheeling light, there are things like chunks of ruby, uncut, the size of fists.

“Once we g-got … caught in a b-blizzard and we made a snow hole to shelter … sc-scooping out a space just big enough for the two of us … like winter animals …”

“Maleeva, we’re nearly there. Hold on!”

But the truth is, I ain’t got a clue what I can do for her when I get across to the sleeper side. Without a battery she’s never gonna make it.

“Cass, I will not let you endanger this vessel and its cargo. I have seen your plan. I watched it grow in your mind.”

“But that don’t matter, does it? Cos you can’t stop me.”

At the edge of the shaft, I try to line up the cable gun on my forearm. It ain’t easy – Maleeva’s gone as limp as a wrung chicken, and my body feels too chunky, what with the both of us stuffed inside the suit.

I fire the cable, watching it trace out a line to the far airlock, and out of nowhere, my view ahead gets blocked by a sight so awful I start yelling. The Okhotnik! It looms up like it’s going to grab me, and I chuck out my arms to fight back. But then it just hangs there like a busted puppet and I cotton on at last. It ain’t got a suit on. It’s frozen solid, twinkling in the Earth light rays – covered in a fur of blood crystals, spikes of flesh bursting out of its eye sockets and mouth. I try and get my breathing under control. How’s it even got here? An accident? Did it top itself? Did the ship egg it on?

I feel Maleeva’s head stir. “I-I awoke first, pushing through the snow. It was calm, c-clear … so c-clean. A hare hopping through the s-snow below me … white fur …”

And then it twigs. The Okhotnik’s frame has got to work like Maleeva’s. I can save her! I latch on to the gently somersaulting body and start rooting for the battery. It’s in the same place – an armored box strapped to its thigh. I fiddle with the catches and rip it free.

“Listen to me, Cass,” goes the ship. “You cannot win. You will not win.”

But I ain’t listening – I just reel myself in toward the airlock. And as I reach level with the hull breach, it’s like a dream, cos I’ve run through all the ways this can pan out.

“You must send back the shuttle for the last flinder,” it warns. “Already the atmosphere is too close. You must do this or you will die, your brother will die …”

I wriggle my legs, trying to snap Maleeva into life. “Come on. You was on the mountain in a snow hole with your ma. You saw this white hare. What then?” But Maleeva’s gone silent on me now.

And in the deep quiet of space, I feel another nip from the countdown cuff. There’s only one tiny freckle of time left. One hour to go.

At last I reach the airlock, untether the cable gun, and wait for the bubble to let me through to the sleeper chamber. All the while I watch the walls for tentacles. But there ain’t no hitches. Maybe I got it worried now. Cos it must know – one hint of an attack and I’m off into the great outdoors and there ain’t no way to recover my flinder once I’m gone. It’s got to play by my rules.